The Wrong Door

first of all i want to say that i am a huge fan of British comedy, starting from the classics like monty python, fawlty towers, french & saunders, ranging over light comedy like coupling, darker territory like black books and black adder, weirder stuff like spaced and the mighty boosh and even enjoying stuff that is as drastic as league of gentlemen and little Britain. with that said and not mentioning every single one of the gazillions of DVD boxes i have at home, i must say that i am actually quite surprised if not shocked, that something like that can come from the land that basically invented most genres of comedy we know of today and started worldwide "franchises" like the office or IT crowd.

this is a series that completely and utterly relies on the use of CGI and overuses the element of "running gags". sadly enough the CGI is at best mediocre and the "running gags" actually backfire as they won't get funnier with every time they get repeated. they start off annoyingly and get to a point where you can barely take it without kicking in the TV screen.

one example: a giant robot is searching for his keys. that's it, no further gag, just a robot looking for his keys. repeated over and over again. not funny? damn right.

the writing has some pikes where it barely hits mediocresy, but for the most part just stays rock bottom. throughout the whole few episodes i wasn't able to laugh or at least enjoy what i was seeing. some of the sketches even had some sadistic elements to them.

i don't have a problem with toilet humor, but at least it gotta be in context. just mentioning certain words over and over again doesn't make them funnier.

it makes me laugh reading some comments around here telling people to "switch of their brains and enjoy" when it comes to this series. it is not about being too high maintenance, it is about laughing about every sh*tty gag in the book. i have nothing against light entertainment. i found movies like van wilder 1&2, naturally blonde ..etc etc very entertaining as i am able to switch off and let go, but this series is just agonzing and by far the worst British TV series i have seen in my life.

What is it with the BBC and producing possibly the worst comedy sketch shows in history? Is it deliberate? I hope so because if the commissioning editor actually finds this stuff funny then the BBC is effectively doomed.

The Wrong Door consists of a stream of wee, poo and bum "jokes" with the odd swear word thrown in an attempt to make it "edgy", evidence of the show's lack of substance and desperation to make any impact at all. In fact, take away the swearing and you could probably broadcast this to an audience who would also find themselves watching Dick & Dom and even then it would be touch and go as to whether they would watch until the end.

The only reason I'd give for watching is so that people can see how bad this is and hopefully it will inspire some good writers to see how easy it is to get stuff on TV and persuade them to come forward.

I can't give it ten because very little comedy is that good. But this had me rolling about with laughter in my hotel bed on a recent visit to London. I had seen trailers of it on the two BBC channels that we get here in Belgium, and was sorry that it was on BBC 3, which we don't get.

Now, by sheer accident - I was zapping to see what was showing on various channels - I've seen it.

All the negative comments that I've read on here "The Wrong Door" may well be true - it is like something produced by kids with their first CGI software - but that's the whole point! It's VERY funny. If it's not, then *I* am! Durrr...

Off to the BBC Shop to see if I can find the DVDs...

While most other reviewers slate this show for its 'over-use' of CGI, they're simultaneously ignoring the fact that this is the USP of the programme. It's like complaining there's too much murder in Poirot.

Indeed, special effects replace a long tradition of making intricate or wonderfully shoddy props prevalent in all British sketch shows up to this point and this can be a bit frightening for anyone born after 1984. It would be incredibly easy for this show to lazily leave us marvelling at the pretty visuals but instead backs itself up with excellent writing, with each episode taking a loose theme ranging from darkly humorous to darkly mad, and excellent performances from an extremely varied comic cast (largely devoid of regulars, helping the surrealism along.)

Let there be no misunderstandings, this is a programme aimed at a younger audience with an unnerving sense of humour (thus the scheduling) meaning criticism can largely be put down to this being "a generational thing." In the end, you can probably filter the audience as being anyone who's ever laughed at an internet video not involving a cat. I laughed.

After forcing myself to watch two episodes of this, I can confidently say that it is the worst "sketch show" I've ever seen. I honestly think that a group of school children, aged roughly 6, were placed into a room with a computer and told to go nuts.

The excessive use of CGI makes it look like the writers just purchased a new computer program and are trying to use it in every situation possible, creating cringe making, childish characters and situations. I can only assume that they couldn't find any actors willing to play the parts and had to resort to making odd, computer generated "things".

I would advise immediately blocking your ears and screaming to anyone who tries to get you to watch the show.